Method of marking fruit



METHOD OF MARKING FRUIT Original Filed Jan. 1'7, 1922 $84.72;} 37 l a; INVENTOR i l ./1MW I 2/ 5 f f 7 A BY A TTORIVEY i To all whom it may concern."

U t T E FREDERICK J. SEVIGNE, MILFORD, NEW HAMPSHIRE mn'rnon or MARKING Faun.

flpplieationflled. January 17, 1922, Serial N 'o. 529,962. Renewed October 8, 1924-.

Be it known that I, FREDERICK J. Snvmm, a citizen of the United States, and resident of Milford, in the countyof Hillsboro and State of New Hampshire, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Methods of Marking Fruit, of which the following is a specification.

This invention relates to the treatment of substantially spherical articles, such as oranges and grape fruits, so as to mark their surfaces with identifying trade-marks, names or words. i

Various attempts have been made to print or brand citrus fruits, and some of said attempts have been quite fairly successful. To obtain the best results it has been necessary to meet the obstacles arising from the fact that such articles vary greatly as to size and also, to a considerable extent, as to shape. Some are far rounder than others. c

To meet the conditions as to size, it has been customary to first sort the articles into a wide range of grades, to obtain fairly accurate uniformity as to the sizes of the articles in each grade.

One of the objects of my invention is to enable citrus fruits or other substantially spherical articles to be marked in an identifying manner without requiring fine preliminary size grading.

Another object is to provide an economical method and machine for effecting the marking of a""rapidly passing series or stream of articles moving continuously, neither the articles nor any parts of the V mechanismf employed having any recipro- A similar parts'in all of the views.

eating motions or points of rest.

With these and other objects in view, my invention consists in the method andin the apparatus or machine substantially as hereinafter described and claimed.

' Of the accompanying drawings Figure 1 is a side elevation of the machine, some parts being broken out.

Figure 2 is a plan view of the same.

Figure 3 is an end elevation from the leftof Figure 1 partly in section.

Figure 4 represents a section on line 44 of Figure 1.

Similar reference characters indicate A suitable frame 12 is provided with bearings for two shafts 13, 14, one of which has a pulley 15 for a belt from any suitable while being rolled source of power such as an electric motor. Secured to the shafts 13, 14, are sprockets 16 connected by a chain- 17 indicated by dotted lines in Figures 1 and 2. The said shafts also carry pulleys 18 for the printing belt 19, said belt bein preferably of rubber, the normal length of the belt being such that the rubber is somewhat stretched when mounted on the. pulleys. At each edge of the belt is a raised flange or rib 20 the purpose ofwhich will be explained hereinafter. v

The surface of-the belt between the-ribs 20 carries one or more printing members 21 which, for the sake of brevity of description, will be hereinafter referred toas stamps. As best indicated, in Figures 1 and 3 the surfaces of the stamps 21 are below the level of the tops of the ribs 20. Said stamps are preferably of rubber and may be molded with the belt. v

Any suitable. means for supplying ink to the faces of the stampsmay be employedr In the embodiment of the invention illustrated, an inking roll 22 is rotatively mountted in a small frame 23 pivoted at 24 to ears of across bar 25 and having a lug 26 through. which a screw 27 passes into a lug" 28 of the cross bar. By means of the screw 27, the frame 23v can be adjusted to ensure "retention of the roll 22 driven, as by a gear 30 carried by its shaft and meshing with a gear 31 (Fig. 3) carried by a shaft 32 mounted in the frame 12 and having a. sprocket wheel 33 (Fig. 1) engaged and driven by the chain .17. The shaft 32 also carries a roll 34 to support the belt and its stamps immediately under the inking roll 22.- In the drawings I have indicated oranges '0 as the spherical articles which are printed by the stamps 21 while being forwarded by a rolling action imparted by the belt and its ribs 20. To yieldingly support the articles along I provide a guiding runway 35 which is somewhat troughshaped in cross sectionYFig. 3). "Said runway has a delivery end 36 (Fig. 1) and at its receiving end is slotted part way to provide fingers 37 (Figs. 2 and 3). The runway is supported by four springs 38, two

at the sides of each end. "Each spring is .coiled around a guiding pin or rod 39 connec-ted at its lower end to the frame of the machine and passing up through an ear 40 of the runway. The tops of the rods 38 have heads 41 to limit the upper position to which the runway can be lifted by the springs.

At the proper times, the receiving end of the runway is intermittentlyl lowered or pulled down to take an orange from the feeder presently described. To effect such lowering against the action of the springs 38 at that end, I provide a shaft 42 with a cam 43 ,(Fig. 1) which acts upon a roll 44 carried by one of two arms 45 of a rock shaft 46, the ends of said arms being connected by links 47 with cars 48 (Fig. 3) of the runway. As indicated in Figure 1 the fingers 37 onto which an orange is delivered each time that the receiving end of the runway is lowered do not extend as a straight continuation of the runway, but are at a slight angle relatively to the runway sons to eliminate tendency of an orange to roll back after it has been picked up by the fingers as hereinafter explained. w

To feed oranges to the runway T provide-a series of cups 49 carried by endless chains 50 mounted on outer sprockets 51 carried by a shaft 52 mounted in arms 53 projecting from the frame 12, and on inner sprockets 54 carried by a shaft 55. Each cup is slotted as at 56 (Figs. 2 and 3).

The shaft 55 is driven by a chain 57 mounted on sprockets carried by said shaft and the main shaft 14, and the cam shaft 42 is driven by a chain 58 mounted on sprockets carried by the shafts 42 and 55. The sprockets and other gearing members are so relatively proportioned as to ensure proper timing of the operation as presently described; and the cups 49 are so spaced, and the printing stamps are so spaced, that each article fed by a cup is printed circumferentially while being rolled along by the belt 19. And yet, if an article is omitted from a cup, no harm occurs at the printing portion of the machine.

In operation, oranges or other substantially spherical articles are located one in each cup 49, by hand or any suitable mechanical device. reaches the runway the receiving end of the latter is depressed by the cam 43 so that the fingers 37 will be low enough to permit the orange in that cup to ride onto said fingers (see Figure 3), the slots 56 in the cup permitting this tobe done without interfering with the continued movement of the cup in the direction of arrow 4;. As soon as that orange is carried to a position above the fingers, and about the time when that cup begins to swing down over the inner shaft 1 55, the cam 43 passes the roll 44 so that the Just before each cup.

springs 38 at the receiving end of therunway instantly lift the runway until the top I of the orange so lifted by the fingers contacts withv the marking and forwarding belt 19. Said belt rolls the orange along and while doing so one of the stamps 21 marks the orange. Finally the orange reaches the delivery end 36 of the runway where it may drop into any suitable receptacle. While the stamps 21 are illustrated as so spaced along the belt that only one will mark an orange, it is obvious that the stamps may be con tinuous so as to apply continuous circumferential printing to each orange. The object of such continuous circumferential printing is toeffect marking all the way around, or at least far enough around to exhibit markings on opposite sides of the fruit, so that some part of the marking on every visible piece of fruit in a basket or crate or elsewhere 'can be seen. In other words, the printing will be observable on both sides of the fruit, and will serve toidentify the goods either by a continuous line of different words or symbols or names or by duplicating a single word, symbol, or name, in a circumferential row, so that the duplicated identifying mark will appear on opposite sides-of the fruit. 4

Little attention need be paid to grading the oranges as to size because, except for excessively large or very small ones, all will be treated alike. This is duesto the fact that the runway is yieldingly mounted, the springs exerting a constant tendency to press it toward the belt and permitting one end to be nearer the belt than the other end according to .the sizes of the successively passing oranges. In other words the runway is mounted to yieldingly rock endwise. If there is only one orange between the runaway and the belt, that orange will be rolled along; and if there are two, one larger than the other, both will be. held in contact with the belt. To illustrate this, Figure 1 shows two oranges one much larger than the other, in the positions described. The spacing and operation of the parts of the machine are such that at no time can there be more than two oranges on the runway.

It will be readily understood that since the runway has no longitudinal movement, the oranges travel along it at one-half the speed of movement of the printing stamps,

so that a stamp catches up with an orange at some point of its travel along the runway.

The ribs 20 of the1belt not only aid in guiding the oranges as they are rolled along, but also facilitate the making of clear impressions on them, especially the larger ones. Uranges, as well as some other articles which may be treated by the machine, are somewhat soft. When rolled along they are sub jected to some pressure caused by the springs 38. Since the ribs 20 project lower than the printing stamps while acting to roll an orange along, said ribs take some of the upward pressure and prevent the existence of any such pressing cont-act between the orange and the printing stamp as might blur the mark printed or injurethe fruit.

Since nothing but the smooth runway and the belt comes in contact with the fruit during the operation, and since such contact is a rolling one, the imprints on the fruit are clear and the fruit is not damaged in any way. And there is no possibility of the fruit contacting with a marker 21 before being subject to suflicient pressure to ensure clear marking. This is largely due to the fact that one member -(the belt) effects both the forwarding and the marking.

The provision of the forwarding belt with marking stamps, the runway being below the belt, renders it easy to properly ink the stamps because the inking roller can be (as it is) located above the upper stretch of the belt where it is readily accessible. It will be readily understood that it would be quite difiicult to ink a marking stamp located on or in the runway.

I do not limit myself to the employment of markers which need to be inked in order to apply to the articles something to identify their origin, as any other suitable markers may be employed in lieu of the printing stamps 21.

While my invention has particular reference to the marking of citrus fruits 1* do not limit myself thereto since some kinds of apples and vegetables and nuts are of such nearly spherical shape as to be capable of similar treatment. And of-course various kinds of game balls could be simisignature.

FREDERICK J. SEVIGNE. 

